European Car Sales Drop 27% to 20-Year Low on Economy

European car sales plunged 27 percent in January to the lowest level in at least two decades as the recession and tight credit markets stifled demand for General Motors Corp., Renault SA and Bayerische Motoren Werke AG models.

Registrations fell to 958,517 last month from 1.31 million a year earlier, the Brussels-based European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association said in a statement today. It was the weakest sales volume since the organization began recording data in 1990 and follows a 7.8 percent drop in 2008 to the lowest annual level since 1993.